Private rocket blasts off

SPACEX'S Falcon 9 rocket has blasted off, launching the cargo-laden Dragon capsule into orbit en route to the International Space Station for NASA's first privately run supply mission.

The engine fires blazed a bright trail across the night sky over NASA's Kennedy Space Centre in Cape Canaveral, Florida - the site of many launches into space - after the liftoff on time at 8.35pm on Sunday (11.35am yesterday AEDT).

Ten minutes later, Dragon separated from the second stage of the rocket and reached orbit, where it spread its two wing-like solar antennas.

''It's a great evening. Dragon was inserted into a picture-perfect orbit. Its solar rays deployed and it's driving its way to station,'' SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell said after the launch. ''That's just awesome.''

She later noted there was ''an anomaly on engine one'', though she said she did yet not have further details, adding that the equipment was designed to overcome engine loss, and that it did not create any problems for positioning the capsule.

The mission - the first of 12 planned trips in the US company's $US1.6 billion ($A1.58 billion) contract with NASA - is a milestone for American efforts to privatise the space industry, in hopes of reducing costs and spreading them among a wider group than governments alone.

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''We're handing off to the private sector our transportation to the International Space Station so that NASA can focus on what we do best: exploring even deeper into our solar system with missions to an asteroid and Mars on the horizon,'' NASA administrator Charles Bolden said. ''This is what I call a historic event in the annals of spaceflight.''

The capsule, loaded with 400 kilograms of supplies, is set to reach the space station tomorrow.

SpaceX's craft is the only one in operation that can bring cargo back to Earth. The company, owned by billionaire PayPal co-founder Elon Musk, is one of several private companies working with the US space agency to send flights to and from the station.